Veterans' stories collected for special project
Following years of hard work, the Fannin County students who received the 2018 Ignite Grant award of $10,000 to create a veterans book have officially published their collection of area veteran stories, titled, “Untold Stories,” which is available in each school library.
“It was a lot of work, but it was worth it in the end,” Ignite Grant Board of Directors member and Fannin County High School student Emma Pittman said. “I’m glad that it’s going in the public libraries and the school libraries and all that. It’s good that it’s not just the eight of us that got to work on it. Everybody else gets to see it too.”
The grant’s sponsor, Fannin County Middle School Assistant Principal Mark Young, came up with the idea of publishing the book after hearing of his grandfather-in-law and father-in-law’s experiences in the Vietnam War.
“My father-in-law is the son of a Vietnam vet,” Young said. “His dad was in Vietnam, did his two tours in Vietnam, and basically could have came home, retired here, but his son, who’s my father-in-law, was an only child, and he was in the Army as well, and they were about to send him to Vietnam. Well, the Army had this policy that you couldn’t send the only child and the father at the same time. So, basically, my grandfather-in-law said, ‘Instead of my son going, I’ll go back and do another tour.’ And, of course, he never came back. I’ve heard that story, and my wife never got to meet her grandfather. Hearing that story, I thought, ‘Man, there has got to be more stories like that out here in Fannin County that we don’t know.’ So, we decided that we wanted to make a book.”
After winning the grant, the students excitedly realized they had to get to work to publish the book.
“We worked, and we worked and we worked,” Pittman said. “It took us two, almost three, years to get it completed. COVID-19 struck, and that kind of threw everything all out of whack. That gave us a couple less months, but we got it done.”
Pittman explained that getting to meet with each veteran was easily her favorite part of the experience, stating, “Getting to talk to them, getting to hear their stories. I heard a lot of crazy things, but a lot of fun things too. A lot of memories. I learned a lot, I’ll say that.”
Following the project, Pittman wants people to recognize the importance of reading and remembering these veteran stories.
“We really need to listen to these people and get their stories,” she said. “There’s no way to preserve it, because it can be passed down, and passed down and passed down, but unless you write it, no one outside the family is going to know it, and we need to honor all families no matter if they’re family or not.”
The experience taught the students new skills such as voice recording, interviewing, note taking and more. Some were even able to learn things about veterans within their families that they may not have learned if it weren’t for the project.
It also allowed them to bond and create new friendships through the successes and hardships of the book’s publication.
Young said he was able to watch them grow as students and people, stating, “What I saw in the students, and it had nothing to do with the veterans, but functioning in a group on something that’s not for a grade. This was something real. You could see them step up to their strengths.”
Of the experience, Pittman said, “I got to hear a lot of stuff I wouldn’t have heard, because all my family veterans are either passed away or they live over six hours from here, so I don’t really have anyone in my family that I get to talk to about that. Getting to talk to these people was so fascinating. They could have been in the Army at they same time, but done completely different things, and stuff like that hadn’t even crossed my mind before.”
Pittman was joined by fellow Board of Directors members Hayden Tucker, Lucas Bain, Makain Watson, Colin Bruce, Olivia McAllister, Haven Stiles and Prater in publishing the book.
“This book has allowed us to honor our veterans and the veterans of our community, which means so much to us,” the board wrote in the book. “Our group has been so privileged to be able to honor our veterans that will last for many generations. So many men and women have fought and sacrificed great lengths so we can have a chance to write and publish a book. And we all hope that we can make a difference in teaching people the importance of remembering their local veterans and all veterans of every war.”